Recently I led a discussion between Mexican and U.S. students via digital videoconference regarding the environmental challenges facing the wider Caribbean region. It was inspirational to watch as the students asked each other questions and realized that in spite of cultural or language differences, they shared a common environment and a common concern to protect it.

For these youngsters and the millions of others from our region who will inherit the results of our stewardship, we must safeguard our natural environment. On April 22, Earth Day, the United States will renew its commitment to this ideal.

Indeed, more than ever before, the United States is deeply engaged with the world community in fighting environmental degradation. We are achieving this goal through the new consensus we have forged on development assistance. At its core, this new approach is about taking care of people. It links environmental stewardship, economic growth, and social development in order to lift people out of poverty. After all, it’s impossible for citizens to focus on protecting their environment when they are hungry or sick, or their daily life is punctuated by violence and corruption.

Partnership among governments, the private sector, and non-governmental organizations is the watchword of this new strategy. Through such partnerships we can increase citizen involvement, promote the use of cutting-edge science and technology, welcome entrepreneurship, encourage trade and protect the environment.

President Bush has committed an unprecedented level of new resources to carry out this strategy. Last year, he called for a $5-billion increase over three years in U.S. development assistance to poor countries. And the President is on track to meet his $15 billion, five-year commitment to fight the global pandemics of HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria.

This outlay from the American people represents the largest international assistance package for the developing world in U.S. history. It is in the spirit of President Truman’s Marshall Plan and President Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress. And it will leverage a great deal more in private investment from other countries.

In the area of forest conservation, we can see an example of this new approach. Together with some 29 governments, international organizations, business and environmental groups, we’ve formed the Congo Basin Forest Partnership. It aims to establish national networks of protected areas across central Africa in order to safeguard one of the two largest intact tropical forests. At the same time, it offers local people a stake in the forest by promoting sustainable harvesting and providing livelihoods such as ecotourism.

Driving forces in this partnership are the six Congo Basin countries that have courageously bet their future well-being on the benefits of forest conservation. These nations see a future based on enjoying, not exploiting, nature.

The United States will contribute $53 million over four years to create the training programs, infrastructure, and management and enforcement regimes necessary to make the vision of a system of protected areas a success. In total, we have the potential of developing as many as 27 national parks and protecting more than 10 million hectares.

We are also engaged in forest conservation through debt-for nature swaps. These innovative agreements allow developing nations to simultaneously reduce their debt to the United State government and protect valuable tropical forests. For instance, an agreement with Peru will enable the preservation of more than 12.5 million hectares of rain forest -- habitat for rare species like scarlet macaws, jaguars, and pink river dolphins.

These are just a few of dozens of partnerships that the US has forged to expand the circle of development and create a more hopeful and secure world for all of us.

In addition to this new approach, we continue to cooperate with our neighbors in the hemisphere. The United States has a long history of collaboration with Mexico, beginning formally with the 1936 Mexico-US Convention for the Protection of Migratory Birds and Game Animals. It continues today as we work to conserve migratory species such as neotropical birds, restore wetlands, manage our water basins, forests, and protected areas, and safeguard the Gulf of Mexico.

Of course, we also remain committed to the goal of stabilizing --- and eventually reducing --- greenhouse gas concentrations at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with the climate. In this regard, we spend $1.7 billion annually on climate science and related research. We have also cemented 13 formal bilateral relationships with both developed and developing countries to address climate change. Mexico, with whom we share a commitment to expanding and intensifying our bilateral efforts in this area, is one of these countries. Together with the U.S., these countries account for more than 70% of greenhouse gas emissions.

The challenges that I have described are complex. As our countries face these challenges, I am confident that our young people, such as those who participated in the conversation regarding the Caribbean Ecosystem, have the commitment, energy, and ability to tackle them.

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